Birthdays
Ioan Gruffudd b. 1973 (Fantastic Four)
Elisabeth Shue b. 1963 (Back to the Future II and III, Piranha 3-D)
David Brin b. 1950
(won 1984 Hugo and Nebula for Startide Rising)
(won 1988 Hugo for The Uplift War)
The sentence structure that does the best job of making me feel old is "You know who just turned 50?" In this case, it's the cute little star of Adventures in Babysitting. Tempus fugit, bitchez.
Besides the big awards, Brin also had one of his stories The Postman turned into a major motion picture. If you are having a hard time remembering it, that may be because it starred Kevin Costner.
Many happy returns of the day to everyone on our list today.
Predictor: T.V. Powderly, labor leader, asked for predictions about 1993 on the occasion of the 1893 Columbian Exhibition.
Predictions (and reality): The population will grow from 63,000,000 to 300,000,000. (actual in 1993: 258,000,000, not a bad guess.)
All children educated to use tools. (Shop class. Do we still have mandatory shop class?)
On government, initiative and referendum will prevail. (Definitely more than in 1893, but this once progressive system will be hijacked by the interests of corporations and the rich.)
Labor organizations will have disappeared, for they will no longer be necessary. (You can't fool me, I'm working for the union. Actually, he's right about unions dwindling and wrong about them being unnecessary.)
Railroads, water courses, telegraphs, telephones and pneumatic tubes will all be owned by the government. (Obviously a commie who wants to round us up and shoot us. I know because some guy on Twitter told me that's what all commies want. Still, he mentioned pneumatic tubes.Yay!)
Cremation will take the place of burying the dead. Living will be healthier, for the earth will not be poisoned by the internment of infection. (Hmm, not so much. We are healthier by far, but not because we gave up burying the dead. We actually started curing diseases, most notably tuberculosis, which was the number two killer just behind influenza, which we have contained remarkably with vaccines. In 1893, "curing disease" was crazy talk, only claimed by charlatans.)
The contents of the sewers will no longer flow into rivers and streams. (This is true in some places. Others, not so much.)
There will be no very rich or very poor. Under such conditions, prisons and poorhouses will decline and divorces will not be considered necessary. (That's a big zero for five. We no longer call them poor houses, but low income housing does still exist.)
Looking one day ahead... INTO THE FUTURE!
Moving the weekly schedule around due to a couple of predictions from movies this week, Isaac Asimov's 1964 predictions get the Monday slot instead of the Tuesday this week.
Join us then... IN THE FUTURE!
I think I shall start including pneumatic tubes in all my buildings. They're due for a comeback!
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure if you are being ironic, but I honestly think it's a great idea. I have no idea how bad wear and tear is on the tubes over time, but if the upkeep isn't bad, they would be a great selling point. Being in a room and hearing the "Thoop!" of an arriving tube was the "You've got mail!" of two generations ago.
DeleteI am changing my alerts on my phone RIGHT NOW.
DeleteBetween the pneumatic tubes and the HVAC ducting, Terry Gilliam may be our most futuristic movie-maker.
Deleteright on zrd! no dragons, no unicorns,starships ftl or not look more difficult and farther in the future every day, no moon or mars colonies anytime soon, not only are we not terraforming venus, we may end up having to (try to) terraform the earth itself. we no longer have even zeppelins to speak of. but we can at least fulfill our grandparent's vision of pneumatic tubes, goddamnit.
ReplyDeletei have read recently about some interesting sf-worthy things, though. they have created so-called solid light, light that can bounce off of other light. as one of the researchers said, 'we have just invented lightsabres!' and our first (albeit sadly deceased) interstellar traveler is already en route. a portion of the remains of clyde tombaugh, discoverer of pluto (it is so a planet! sorry dr. tyson, don't even start) is heading to that very planet and then out of the solar system aboard the new horizons probe. and we may already be martians; there is reason to believe that the molecular precursors of life could have developed much more easily on mars and come here via meteor.